


disassembled as a whole

by badbrains



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Angst, Gen, Pre-Nogitsune, Pre-Slash, Stream of Consciousness, Unreliable Narrator, a look into stiles' mental devolvement as he becomes possessed, the grammar is purposefully butchered for the style sorry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:20:11
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,860
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29789073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/badbrains/pseuds/badbrains
Summary: There is darkness where his heart should be.
Relationships: Derek Hale/Stiles Stilinski
Comments: 12
Kudos: 21





	disassembled as a whole

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spaceprincessem](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spaceprincessem/gifts).



> for em's march prompt - "so i was thinking this is set right before stiles realizes he is possessed (maybe right before he visits melissa in the hospital type timeline) and just how he's dealing with symptoms that were like his mom. obviously pre slash cause you're really good at writing that, but give me some of that yearning"
> 
> heads up - the way this reads is very weird and strange and blabber-y which is intentional so if that is not your jam i am sorry ): 
> 
> ummm i apologize for what this turned into JKDHGJKHDJHG
> 
> title is from flatsound’s _i lost control_

The sun is too bright. 

It makes him angry, at first. After a night of almost-sleep, of turning over and startling at shadows, blinking hard and keeping his eyes squeezed shut, waking up and waking up and waking up and 

The sun is too bright and he is so dark and it is fucking infuriating. 

When he slips into the bathroom on sock-soft feet, he winces at how the door creaks, how loud it is in the quiet. His dad is sleeping. He is angry about that, too. He is sleeping. Stiles cannot even think and his dad is - it’s okay. He pointedly does not look into the mirror, he is so so close, barely hanging on, he just can’t. He can’t. 

His fingers shake where they’re gripped around the tube of toothpaste, he is trembling, the tremors outlining the veins in his wrist. The bright blue decorates the bristles in a squiggled line, jagged and imperfect and it makes him feel like a child. It drips, catching the sides of the plastic, sliding down to drop onto Stiles’ hand. He inhales an unsteady breath to combat the scream that bubbles up in his throat. He can hear the buzz of electricity in the bulbs above the mirror, the slight metallic clinking of energy in the coils. 

He uses mouthwash instead. 

  
  
  
  


At lunch, Allison laughs. Lydia says they are all crazy. Allison laughs because it is the nemeton. They say it is the nemeton and it makes sense because Stiles sees the tree and he feels the darkness and he wakes up but he can’t wake up and

Lydia says Beacon Hills is a sleepy town and Stiles feels his breathing pick up. Catch in his chest and burn him. 

Beacon Hills is a sleepy town. Sleepy. God he is so tired and he just - he curls his fingers in and buries his nails into his palm. It stings. It feels good. Wake up wake up wake up 

Stiles, you are bleeding, Scott says. Or exclaims with alarm. Or takes a moment to address himself in a soliloquy for the audience to hear. 

He uncurls his palms and Scott frowns. 

I am, Stiles says. Because he is. Bleeding. 

He pushes back from the lunch table and goes to the bathroom. No mirrors. He doesn’t look into the mirror. He turns the faucet on, cold, he wants it to be cold, and he runs the tap until it is clear. It flows pink for a long, long time. It is the most eventful thing that happens to him that day. Beacon Hills is a sleepy town.   
  


He drifts at the pack meeting. He does not drift to sleep. Never to sleep. But he just. Floats. Derek is talking but Stiles cannot hear because he is looking at the shapes in the floorboards of the loft. He is staring at one that keeps moving, he is trying to follow it but it keeps moving and he gets frustrated so he closes his eyes. But he can’t sleep. Derek lives in a loft now, but Stiles can still hear trains and he can still smell smoke buried in the ash decorating the walls of his burnt home. He smiles. Home. Derek has never really had a home. Or, at least, when he does he cannot keep it. So he smiles and keeps his eyes closed and thinks about where their next pack meeting will be held at. When Derek loses the loft.

Someone grabs his shoulder and he flinches, steps back and opens his eyes. Scott is looking at him. He checks his palms just to make sure. No blood. 

You okay?

He does not know how to answer that question because he is and he isn’t, he really really isn’t. But, the nemeton hurts all of them and Allison’s eyes keep flashing to the dark corners of the loft, head tilting when she hears things that no one else is hearing. Haunted by who she is afraid to become. Scott is plagued by who he is, scared and ashamed to be a werewolf, terrorized by a side of himself he can never shake. So, is he okay? Is he? No. But, he is not the only one. 

His smile tastes bad. Bitter like gasoline. He likes that. Gasoline. It reminds him of burning. His eyes slide to Allison, he thinks of fire and her eyes dart to the black alcove below the stairs. Kate. 

So he smiles. 

Yeah, I’m okay. 

He gets home and he cannot read any of his books. He cannot hear anything over the buzzing. His eyes burn but he cannot rest. It is going to get him. It did get him. But, he wants to feel like he had a choice. His dad is making noise in the kitchen downstairs and Stiles thinks about how he is like this because of him. He saved him and this is what he gets. That isn’t fair. He feels bad for thinking it. 

But, it’s true, something says. 

It is. 

He’s okay.   
  
  
  
  


There’s darkness where his heart should be.

His reflection is a tree stump and his blood is black and 

And Derek is there but he is not really there, Stiles knows he isn’t, because there is darkness and

But, for now, Derek is here. Even when he is not. And Stiles kisses him, and it is soft, and Derek holds him and they are in the bed and he can sleep and 

He is not there, though. 

Not really.

Because he has so many fingers and they are still shaking so he isn’t sleeping but he is not awake and Derek is holding him but he isn’t. 

The sun is so bright. 

  
  
  
  
  


_When is a door no longer a door and when is my mom no longer my mom and when is my house no longer my home and when is my mind no longer mine and_

  
  


Don’t be scared, Mischief, she said. 

Because she checked and there were no monsters in his closet, or under his bed, or behind his curtains. She checked and there were none, and if there had been, she said, she would have made them go away forever. 

She was so nice and she became so mean and Stiles feels mean but really he is just scared because 

He is so sleepy. 

No one is there to check. Who is going to check. He needs someone to check because he cannot do it by himself he is afraid and   
  
  


Derek still has the loft. 

The streak remains broken. For now. 

Stiles sits on the couch and curls his neck over to look at his fingers because he has ten but does he really have ten because what if he stops counting them and suddenly there are more or less so he needs to watch them and make sure there are ten and 

Derek snaps his fingers in Stiles’ face and he nearly cries because he cannot stop counting because what if it gets him so he looks at Derek's hands and he has ten. But does he? He digs his nails into his thighs so he can feel all of them while he isn't looking at them. It makes him feel better. It doesn’t.

Derek wants to know what is wrong with him and that makes Scott upset because Stiles cannot speak for himself because he is fucking crazy and Scott has red eyes but so does Stiles but not because he is powerful, but because he is so so so tired. 

There is nothing wrong with me, he insists and it is overshadowed by Derek’s mean scoff and Scott’s you don’t have to answer him, Stiles.

It goes quiet but no one won. Derek knows enough about loss to see that Stiles is gone. 

No one can reach him.   
  
  
  
  


Scott shows him in the bathroom that they both have all of their fingers.

He wants to look in the mirror, splay his palms out and see because reflections do not lie. But he doesn’t because he can lie and his mind can lie and he is not here but he is, but there is a chance he could not be. But, he is not allowed to look into the mirror because he can’t and Scott has always known better than him, Scott knows how to do damage control. That’s the reason he sits in on meetings, isn’t it. Scott says, yeah, this is Stiles, he is a liability but he is with me. I will pay the price for him to be here. And he does pay. He always pays. 

The door is open and Scott is broke.   
  
  
  
  


_When is a door no longer a door and when is a human no longer valuable and when is a brain scan no longer a brain scan and when does a life no longer register as a life and when does a pack push you out from the inside when you are on the outside and_   
  
  
  


He is so tired but he cannot sleep but he wants to go to bed but he left the door open and he has no idea how to close it.

How does he close it how does it close it how does he close it how does he 

He cannot sleep but he is so tired and whenever he is asleep he is really just awake and everything hurts and he is so dark and

Melissa’s touch feels like mom’s but when is mom no longer mom and when is he no longer himself and when 

She sedates him and his gut churns dark with betrayal when his muscles go lax. He tries to scream but he cannot because he can’t sleep. He tries to tell her, he reaches out to grab Melissa by the front of her scrubs. He cannot move but he grabs her so they are face to face and he tells her that she needs to close the door for him. He needs her to, please. He cannot close it, he doesn’t know how and he is all by himself. 

Please close it, he begs her. He is on his knees, sobbing, crying, pleading. She clicks the light off and the door is open. 

He closes his eyes, but he is not asleep. 

  
  
  
  


The MRI is so bright and his dad is so upset and everything is so loud and this would kill his dad if it ends up killing Stiles. His dad died when his mom died but if Stiles died like his mom died it would ruin him. He can feel it, in his brain, he knows. He knows. 

He is sick but he is not dying. He is sick but he is not his mom. 

That’s right, it says. 

He’s right. It has been a second since he was right. 

The door is open but now it is a corridor and the doorknob is gone and the hinges are rusted and it cannot shut, it could never shut, it was always open and 

_When is a door no longer a door and when is Stiles no longer Stiles?_

  
  
  
  
  


When he is void. 

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> ouch


End file.
